Android Market Is Bringing In-App Billing Next Week

In-app billing on Android was announced back in January and now, we are only a week away from its official launch. With in-app billing, users will enjoy easy checkout processing for apps on the Android Market. The Android developers’ blog has announced this by saying,

Back in January we announced our plan to introduce Android Market In-app Billing this quarter. We’re pleased to let you know that we will be launching In-app Billing next week.
In preparation for the launch, we are opening up Android Market for upload and end-to-end testing of your apps that use In-app Billing. You can now upload your apps to the Developer Console, create a catalog of in-app products, and set prices for them. You can then set up accounts to test in-app purchases. During these test transactions, the In-app Billing service interacts with your app exactly as it will for actual users and live transactions.

The feature is currently in a testing phase where developers can test the behavior of the app, but not publish it along with their apps. Once the service is launched, it will complete its three milestones to the final release.

Currently, the app is restricted to Android Market version 2.3.4 and Android OS version 1.6 and higher. The payment process is secured with RSA. More information on limitations and a sample application can be found at this page.